Birmingham born-and-bred Marie Tierney recently published her debut novel, Deadly Animals – a crime fiction story set in Birmingham and starring a teenage detective, Ava. I interviewed Marie to chat about her novel, its inspiration, and what is next for her.

Marie, this is the moment that every aspiring author dreams of – the publication of their debut novel. How does it feel?

It feels surreal and wonderful. I’m still in shock! It was something I always wanted to do: write a book and get it published. When I held my first hardback copy of Deadly Animals in my hands, it was akin to holding my newborn son – something I have created that has monumental importance to me and will hopefully grow to have a positive impact on the rest of the world.

People underestimate the innovative power of daydreaming, of thinking for thinking’s sake and then acting on an idea that comes to mind. 

Tell us a bit about your life growing up in Birmingham. What does Birmingham mean to you?

I grew up the eldest of three sisters, raised by a single mother on council estates in South Birmingham. We were poor but bright. We had to entertain ourselves because there were only three-channels on TV in those days and two of those hid behind a test-card for most of the day, so we had to find things to do. We listened to records, taught ourselves to sing and dance, we painted and sketched and we wrote our own stories. We could play out and stay out, make dens, go for long rambles in the nearby woods and fields. We had access to libraries and the Birmingham art galleries and museums. And most of all we had freedom to daydream – people underestimate the innovative power of daydreaming, of thinking for thinking’s sake and then acting on an idea that comes to mind. 

Birmingham means a great deal to me because it forged the person I became, who I am today. 

What drew you to writing a crime novel, and specifically one that stars a young teenager as a detective?

I am a dark-minded person interested in macabre subjects and themes, and I have always been this way. Ava, the protagonist in Deadly Animals, is based on me as a child. I can’t write romances and I certainly can’t write children’s books! I’ve always loved crime fiction by authors such as Thomas Harris and Lynda la Plante, and I’ve always loved horror, such as Stephen King and Edgar Allen Poe. Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment had a profound effect on me when I first read it as a teenager. There are many more great influences on my work and they all seem to push me in the direction of crime fiction writing. The idea of a young girl as a detective is simply me living a childhood dream through fiction – what if I had found the dead body of a missing child? Which of my skill sets and interests would I have used to assist [in] the investigation? Everybody underestimates children – especially girls and especially back then – so [Ava’s] subterfuge detective work is very in keeping with how I was and how the world was at the time. I liked that challenge.

The idea of a young girl as a detective is simply me living a childhood dream through fiction

Who read your early drafts of Deadly Animals? Has the novel turned out as you expected it would when you began writing, or is the end result rather different from what you imagined?

I had two lovely people who read the early drafts: a close friend who I trusted and my honest agent. Both read through the early drafts and their overwhelming positivity encouraged me to not only keep going with it, but to finish. It became a huge project and I had to whittle it down to 100,000 words. It was originally a Whydunnit? – like The Silence of The Lambs – where we knew who the antagonist was very quickly, but it was the detective’s journey to the same discovery that kept us on edge. My publisher/editor encouraged me to change it into a Whodunnit?, which meant an overhaul of the original style while keeping the core character and plot of the story. I think it works better and I loved making the changes. I am glad I took on the suggestions because it made it a better book. It is a better end result to what I imagined. 

Have your husband and son read your book – and if so, what do they think?

My husband is reading it at the moment and my son will do so when he isn’t as busy as he is at the moment. They’ll let me know what they think of it when they’re ready!

I am currently writing the sequel to Deadly Animals and I am really enjoying the process

Who is the crime writer you would most like to meet?

There are many authors I would love to meet, but I would love to meet Lynda la Plante because I have read so many of her books and watched so many of the television series she has created, and I love them. 

What’s next for you?

Writing full-time! I am currently writing the sequel to Deadly Animals and I am really enjoying the process, especially having learned so much from creating the first novel.

Deadly Animals by Marie Tierney is published by Zaffre at £16.99

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